This was heard on a local CBS t.v. news promo. It is a congruent conflation of “turn on a dime” and “change on a moment’s notice”, both meaning to act quickly. This malaphor might have been caused by the word “change” as it relates to money, although I don’t get a whole lot of dimes anymore in change. Dimes seem to show up a lot in malaphors, possibly due to their use in various expressions – “turn on a dime, “stop on a dime”, “dropped the dime”, “get off the dime”, “nickel and dimed”, etc. Some previous posts include “I fall asleep at the drop of a dime” (https://malaphors.com/2014/06/26/i-fall-asleep-at-the-drop-of-a-dime/) and “you had to figure out what to do on a dime’s notice” (https://malaphors.com/2014/05/20/you-had-to-figure-out-what-you-were-going-to-do-on-a-dimes-notice/). The latter was heard and submitted by the Master Spotter of Malaphors Steve Grieme, who also heard and sent me the one posted today! Steve certainly is not a dime a dozen when it comes to malaphors. He’s the top of the notch!

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